by Gabe Saglie, Senior Editor, Travelzoophotos by Karen Steinwachs, winemaker, Buttonwood and Bob Dickeystory published in the Santa Barbara News-Press on 6/18/15

Enjoying Red, White & Blues by the Buttonwood vines (Steinwachs)

The Red,
White & Blues Concert – the annual fete that blends two of our area’s top
wine labels with some of blues music’s top talent – is easily one of Karen Steinwach’s
favorite events of the year.

“It’s really
casual,” the winemaker at Buttonwood Farm tells me, as we reminisce about the
July 4th-inspired concert we’ve both attended in years past.This year’s event, slated for Saturday, June
27th, from 2 to 6pm at Buttonwood, marks its 20th
anniversary.“People bring these
elaborate picnics, families comes together and spread out a big blanket, and we
all drink wine and eat and listen to music by the vines.”

The venue has
certainly been part of this party’s appeal over the years: a rolling green lawn
flanked by Buttonwood Farms’ blooming grapes, swaying trees and a shimmering pond.Set on a plateau above the tasting room off
Alamo Pintado Road in Solvang, it’s a beautiful portion of this expansive and
fertile property that visitors rarely get to see.

The music stage is cradled by the vines and the pond (Steinwachs)

The wine is
a draw, too, of course.This event has
long been a partnership between Buttonwood and Rick Longoria, the celebrated
Lompoc-based winemaker who is also a big blues fan.His Blues Cuvee red wine blend sells fast
each vintage, in part, because of the label; since 1993, it’s been the canvas
for an artist series of commissioned paintings celebrating blues artists,
making it a yearly collector’s item for many wine lovers.“Rick is also the one who picks the band” for
the Red, White & Blues Concert, Steinwachs says.This year, local favorite The Stiff Pickle
Orchestra will open for the celebrated Arthur Adams and His Blues Band, which
is back by popular demand.

Karen Steinwachs (Dickey)

As the blues
play, guests can buy Buttonwood and Longoria wine.Steinwachs is still finalizing her three
selections for the afternoon but is leaning toward two of her latest releases:
a malbec and a grenache, estate wines that each take an acre of growing space
on Buttonwood Farm.“The Malbec is a
classic carnivore wine,” Steinwachs tells me.“But it’s a lot fruitier than our other Bordeaux wines, with a great
blackberry character and tannins that are not so assertive.”

Rick Longoria (Dickey)

The grenache
is “a really nice summery wine, perfect for this time of year,” Steinwachs
adds.“It’s more delicate and pairs with
smoky foods really nicely.”

Buttonwood’s
recent release of these two reds is no coincidence.The winery always puts wines on the shelf
based on the calendar.“And this is
definitely barbecue season,” says Steinwachs, who’s been making Buttonwood’s
wines for the last eight years, following stints at Fiddlehead and Foley.

Her third
latest release is the ever-popular Zingy, a zippy, tangy, acid-fueled rendition
of sauvignon blanc that screams summer; it’s a favorite in our household year
after year.

This month’s
20th anniversary concert will be a welcomed respite for Steinwachs,
who’s been tackling growing season curve balls wrought by California's drought.Critter influx is on the rise – from coyotes
who like to nibble on drip lines to ground squirrels who like to nibble on
stems to deer who like to nibble on leaves.But her vineyard team has successfully managed to battle the water
shortage with aggressive pruning and by taking the cover crop all the way to
the dirt.

“We have these
beautiful shiny green leaves now,” Steinwachs says.And while “grape clusters aren’t looking as
big” as in the past three years, the optimistic winemaker says, “that’s ok with me!”

The Red,
White & Blues Concert is a family-friendly event that will draw about 250
wine and music lovers.Tickets are $54
for adults and $22 for children, with free entry for kids six and younger. For your tickets, click here.

by Gabe Saglie, Senior Editor, Travelzoophotos by Saglie and Bob Dickeystory published in the Santa Barbara News-Press on 6/4/15

On a day
that was quintessentially Santa Barbara – it was 70-something and sunshine
sparkled through the swaying leaves of the towering oak trees lining Mission
Creek – the Magnificent Seven reminisced.

Meridith
Moore had casually thrown the title out there, and it fit.The events manager at the Santa Barbara
Museum of Natural History had invited these seven winemakers to visit and to share memories of what is Santa Barbara’s oldest wine fete.The 28th Santa Barbara Wine
Festival will take place Saturday, June 27th, from 2-5pm, and all these men, all
of whom poured at the inaugural event, will be there.(To be accurate, Drake Whitcraft didn’t
actually pour at the original fete since, at age 14 months, he was there in diapers, as his parents poured;
but ever since he came of age, he's been manning the Whitcraft table each year.)

“My kids
have all slept on that rock while I poured,” says Au Bon Climat’s Jim Clendenen
with a laugh, pointing to an oversize stone that has marked his spot at the
event for years.“They’re 15 and 20
now.”

“I remember playing
in that creek, until I was old enough to pour,” adds Whitcraft Winery's Drake Whitcraft, pointing
to the meandering cleft in the earth nearby.His father, the late Chris Whitcraft, was among the founding fathers of
the festival, and his son continues his tradition today.

“That first
year, I remember pouring wines from bottles that didn’t have labels on them
yet,” recalls Alma Rosa Winery’s Richard Sanford, a legend in the Santa Barbara
wine industry who planted the first pinot noir vines in the Sta. Rita Hills
near Lompoc in 1971.“And of course, a
lot of these trees were much smaller then!”

The very
natural setting at this museum, in fact, has always been a draw for Mr.
Sanford, and a big reason why he pours here in person.The schedules of winemakers of this repute –
Ken Brown, Doug Margerum, Fred Brander and Qupe’s Bob Lindquist have also gathered
here – can be demanding, and winery reps often pour at wine events in the
winemaker’s place.But “I love being in
nature,” he says, “and I love connecting with the season here.”

“Yeah, this
is the prettiest tasting I do,” Mr. Clendenen adds.“It’s the pride of Santa Barbara.”

And then,
almost as if on cue, a band of young children frolics past; they climb on the
rocks nearby and burst into a quick game of tag before they run down the dirt
path.The winemakers take a break from
sipping the wines they’ve brought to share with each other, and watch.The kids’ visit is a daily occurrence here, as
more than 40,000 students a year come spend the day with docents, scientists
and curators who engage them in natural history.The money raised by the Santa Barbara Wine
Festival – about $75,000 last year – is what pays for this type of outreach,
which touches students from throughout the state.

“And that’s
why we love this museum and this wine festival,” Mr. Sanford remarks, as the
group turns back to their glasses.

Jim Clendenen at the 2014 Festival (Dickey)

“Plus, it’s
the best attended festival in the Santa Barbara community,” adds Mr. Margerum.“And that’s important, because these people
end up being your best advocates.”

“And then
there are all those frilly summer dresses!” Mr. Clendenen interjects, to
laughter and nods from the rest.

﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿

Indeed, the
annual feast that always takes place in early summer gets consistently high
marks for its relaxed and jovial feel.The weather is idyllic, the setting is bucolic and the crowd of about
1000 is good-humored and all-smiles.The
wineries that pour are there by invitation only – 50-or-so of the area’s
best-loved labels, spanning Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and Ventura
Counties.“They are innovative, embrace
sustainability, put quality above quantity and, in my opinion, can match up
against wines from around the world,” says Ms. Moore.
﻿

Richard Sanford at the 2014 Festival (Dickey)

Aside from the Magnificent Seven, wineries
like Babcock, Larner, Cambria, Foxen and Tercero will pour once again this
year.A couple of new projects, like
Jamie Sloane Wines, will join them.And
top area restaurants and chefs, like Finch & Fork, Bob’s Well Bread, Barbareño, Via Maestra 42, and
Renaud’s Patisserie will dole out gourmet bites.﻿﻿﻿﻿

There’s no
auction at this festival.Instead, the
museum holds its Every Cork Wins! raffle.Corks cost $30, with each one a winner, and with prizes ranging from $30
to $250 or more.

Drake Whitcraft at the 2014 Festival (Dickey)

The Santa
Barbara Wine Festival was actually preceded by a small gathering of winemakers
on the museum’s grounds in 1978.That
event was the brainchild of local poet Lisl Auf der Heide, who recruited the
help of her husband, the late wine connoisseur Ralph Auf der Heide, as well as late
winemaker Chris Whitcraft and wine industry long timer Jim Fiolek. It benefitted Friendship House in Montecito.

The Santa
Barbara Museum of Natural History took over production of that small festival
in 1983, launching the official Santa Barbara Wine Festival.Early on, proceeds were earmarked for the
oceanic charity, Save Our Seas.But when
profitability waned, the festival moved to the Music Academy of the West in
Montecito where, for years, it was a spectacular culinary feast.It wasn’t until 10 years ago, in a deal with
the city that would allow the Academy to renovate in exchange for giving up
hosting special events, that the Museum brought the Wine Festival back
home.Ms. Moore has helmed it ever
since.

As they
discuss the Festival’s past, the Magnificent Seven begin to recall their own
histories in the local wine industry.

“I don’t
think we had high expectations back then, because there was nothing to
emulate,” says Fred Brander, who planted Santa Barbara County’s first
commercial sauvignon blanc vineyard in 1975; he would quickly become a
veritable benchmark for Bordeaux wine production in this area.

“I started
to make wine to support a habit,” jokes Bob Lindquist, who started his career
in the early 1980s alongside Mr. Clendenen; he’d actually go on to produce
some of the most celebrated syrah in California.

Mr.
Lindquist’s first boss, Ken Brown, planted Santa Barbara County’s first syrah
grapes in 1977, at Zaca Mesa Winery.But
he engages his colleagues in a chat about Sta. Rita Hills pinot noir now.“That was always my first love,” he says of the
grape that, today, has become his eponymous label’s main focus.

As the
glasses begin to empty, Mr. Sanford brings the conversation back to the
Festival, and he connects past with future.“Here we are again, 28 years later, and half the people who’ll be at the
Festival weren’t even old enough to drink when we started,” he says.“So we can’t forget – this is also about awareness
and education, which will always be important.”

Less than 200
tickets for this year’s Santa Barbara Wine Festival remain.For information, contact the Santa Barbara
Museum of Natural History at www.sbnature.org.

When
entrepreneur and vintner Bill Price met winemaker Gavin Chanin a few years ago,
he was impressed.The man with a
formidable perspective – Price has ownership in several high-profile Northern
California vineyards and labels like Kistler and Three Sticks – saw promise in
the UCLA grad who’d trained in Santa Barbara with the likes of Jim Clendenen and
Bob Lindquist.Of course, so had Forbes,
which had already put the founder of Chanin Wine Company to its “30 Under 30”
list, and Food & Wine Magazine, which had already named him a Winemaker of
the Year.I included Chanin in my own “Top 10 Santa Barbara Winemakers Under 35” feature two years ago.

Price and
Chanin would set off on an experiment – a label to focus on single-vineyard,
small-production pinot noir and chardonnay made from stellar California
vineyards.

The result
was LUTUM – the word means “soil” in Latin.I got to taste some of these wines for the first time a few weeks ago at
Wine + Beer, the wine lover’s watering hole inside the Santa Barbara Public
Market.This has quickly become one of my
favorite wine shops in town for its variety of both local and international labels,
its fair pricing and the focused consumer events that it hosts regularly.

At this one,
the two vineyards in the spotlight are Santa Barbara County landmarks: Sanford
& Benedict and La Rinconada.Both
lay in the coveted Sta. Rita Hills growing area, near Lompoc, and both were planted
by pioneer Richard Sanford (Sanford & Benedict in 1971, La Rinconada in
1995).But each vineyard, as exhibited
through the LUTUM wines, is unique.

The 2012
Sanford & Benedict Chardonnay exhibits a classic golden hue and refreshing
flavors of apple and tropical fruits.The mouth feel is luscious – a hint of the 18 months this wine spent in
25% new French oak – and the finish is clean.

The 2012
Sanford & Benedict Pinot Noir has a lively tart quality on the palate that
sings of cranberries and cherries.There’s wonderful structure to this wine and the brilliant acidity gives
it solid aging potential.

The 2012 La
Rinconada Pinot Noir, by contrast, is darker and more dense.Red fruit flavors and rounded tannins give
this wine an elegant, balanced richness.

For LUTUM,
Chanin also sources locally from La Encantada Vineyard, another Sta. Rita Hills
planting by Sanford, and Bien Nacido, the storied vineyard planted in the Santa
Maria Valley by the Miller family in 1973.Sonoma sources include the celebrated Durrell and Gap’s Crown Vineyards,
both owned by Price.

Consumers
get their next chance to taste through the LUTUM wines this Saturday, June 6th,
at 6pm, when Chanin joins Executive Chef Derek Simcik of Outpost Restaurant at
the Goodland Hotel for a five-course dinner.This intimate meal – only 32 seats are available – will take place
inside The Kitchen at the Santa Barbara Public Market, 38 W. Victoria
Street, downtown, and is priced at $95.Menu items include a squab entrée served with wild forage mushrooms,
potatoes and blackberries and paired with the 2012 Durell Vineyard pinot.

About Me

Welcome to the online home of Gabe Saglie. Gabe is Senior Editor for Travelzoo and a respected travel contributor for dozens of TV news programs and national shows. Gabe is also a longtime wine and food writer based in Santa Barbara, California, where he lives with his wife, two boys and daughter.